


Boiling point

by AussieOnyx



Series: Lynchpins [1]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Car Accident, Gen, hard choices, insight to howard's mind, more than she appears
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-16
Updated: 2014-10-16
Packaged: 2018-02-21 10:13:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2464529
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AussieOnyx/pseuds/AussieOnyx
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At the point where he's about to die, Howard is given insight to the future and is faced with a hard choice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Boiling point

**Author's Note:**

> Another plot bunny bit me.. this takes place in the same universe as 'the bargain', but i still haven't figured out how to link a pre-exisiting work into a series... if anyone is able to clue me in, it would be appreciated...  
> On another note, I've always found it interesting to wonder what would happen if Howard realised that he'd messed up raising his son- would he try to fix things if he could?  
> Hope you enjoy it

Howard never did see what caused the car to go over the embankment. 

All had seemed well. Maria was dozing in the seat next to him, minutes from a deep sleep, Sinatra crooning on the radio about the wonders of New York and the early autumn sun was shining pleasantly on his face as he steered the Astin Martin down the road.  
Normally, they'd have a driver- it was far easier to catch up on the paperwork that seemed to breed like a rabbit at an orgy when in the back seat of a car- but sometimes, Howard liked to take a step back and enjoy the simple pleasure of taking a drive with his wife.  
Part of him wished that he'd made different choices in the past, that he'd spent a little less time in the office or his lab and more time playing catch with his kid, or showing him his dreams hidden at the expo- the ones that even Obie wasn't aware of. But those bridges had been burnt a long time ago. They were burnt and there was no going back. Howard was lucky if Tony even answered his phone calls these days. 

If there was one thing that Howard regretted more than not playing with his kid more, it was that he let his own prideful blindness and refusal to acknowledge all of the things that had brought his family to this point. It was supposed to be his responsibility as the head of the family to hold everyone together, and he hadn't. He'd failed. It was a hard pill to swallow.  
Maria had been slowly drinking herself into liver failure for the last decade. The vitality that had once sparkled in her eyes, that had drawn Howard to her all those years ago, was dimming as she lost herself in the bottle. Today was one of the first that he'd seen Maria without a wine glass in her hand.  
Tony was seconds away from catching the clap or making him a grandfather too soon. While his son was doing well at university and showed all the signs of matching, even surpassing, his own accomplishments, Howard worried that Tony was going to isolate himself with no comfort but that of his robots, steel and ammunition, to the point of dying alone. Howard wanted Tony to have a family, to find a woman who would be his ballast and anchor. He wanted Tony to have a strong partnership with his future wife; to be able to look at his daughter-in-law and know that she would be the one to haul Tony out of his workshop to put their kids to bed at night, or call time so that Tony would make it to his kid's school recitals.  
Howard wanted Tony to be better than him.

Howard was drawn from his introspection by a cracking noise. Figuring it was probably someone out hunting deer, Howard returned his attention to the road. 

There was a part of the road coming up that was notorious for causing accidents. Howard had driven it before many times, so he knew that the best way to travel it safely was in second gear. Down-shifting to third, a flash of something metallic in the tree line nearly distracted Howard from negotiating the first of the hair-pin bends in time. As it was, he was going too fast and barely hit the brakes in time to stop the car from going through the barrier and over the edge.  
Putting the car in park, Howard took a moment to breathe, calm his heart-rate and stop his hands from shaking at the near miss.  
Too close.  
Maria was still sleeping in the seat next to him. She hadn't even stirred. Which was a little odd- unless she was drunk, Maria had a tendency to wake up at the sound of a pin-drop. Clenching a fist momentarily to stop the trembling, Howard felt for her neck pulse. It was there, but very slow. Almost too slow and weak. Shit. She'd taken something.  
Looking in her bag, Howard found a prescription bottle for Valium. It was dated a week ago, but there weren't enough pills there. Even if she'd taken the prescribed amount everyday since getting them, there should be more pills. Doing a quick calculation in his head, Howard figured that she'd been double dosing herself, maybe even tripling. She needed a hospital. Soon.  
Putting the car back into gear, Howard took off and drove faster than he knew he should for this stretch of road.

With his attention split between Maria and the road, Howard didn't feel the rumbling until the car started to list.  
The next thing he knew was pain. Howard felt a rib snap as he was slammed into the door's arm-rest and then another rib snap as he was pushed into the seat-belt. Looking out the window, he could see the road-way falling away around him. Land-slide.  
The car must have caught on a fallen tree or something, because the next thing he knew, the car was rolling. Trying to brace himself against the roof and door, Howard was helpless to stop Maria from being thrown around. Her seat-belt only doing so much to stop her limp body turning into a rag-doll. He wasn't aware that he was screaming until he heard another snapping noise- Maria's neck- when the screams turned into sobs.  
It felt like they were falling for hours. Hours of tumbling and shattered glass, hours of knowing that his wife was dead beside him, hours of feeling his blood dripping up and down his arms and face with each rotation of the tangled metal. Hours of hearing the sound of shattering glass and wishing that he could be anywere else.  
It felt like hours, but was actually seconds.

When the car finally came to a stop, thankfully not on the roof, all that was left was the sound his own rasping breaths filling the remains of the car and the occasional tinkle of falling glass.  
The pain was making Howard hazy. He was almost sure that his broken ribs had punctured one, if not both of his lungs if the wet sound of his breathing was any indication.  
Any chance of rescue before three hours had passed, while trapped in the shell of the once luxury car was extremely remote. The section of the road where the car went down was in the midpoint between the only two towns with urgent care facilities, let alone search and rescue engines. Even if a good samaritan managed to come along in the next minute, it would still be at least two hours until someone would be able to get to him. He was too smart to not know the reality of his situation.  
He wished that the had been able to say goodbye to his son. He wished that he would be able to tell Tony that he was truly, truly proud of all that he had been able to do, make and become. He wished that he would have been able to tell Tony that he really did love him.  
Howard could feel himself becoming tired and was trying to fight falling asleep. The part of him that clung to false hope refused to just give in to the end- he'd survived two major international wars as well as the cluster fuck 'police action' that was Vietnam. He'd be damnned if he didn't fight this latest battle to the bitter end. Even if the end was a few short hours away.

More time passed and Howard was beginning to drift in and out of consciousness. In his more lucid moments, Howard made rash promises to himself that he'd be a better father from this point on... if he only lived to do so.  
He was just about to promise himself an actual vacation to somewhere tropical when his drifting mind drew him to an oddness in the air around him. For some reason, Howard could smell lavender and something that reminded him of pasta... it was weird in the surrounding scent of crushed pine, hot metal and his own blood. It wasn't Maria's perfume- she favoured Chanel- claimed it was sophisticated. Used to favour.

The crunch of footsteps prompted Howard to try and turn his head to see out the window. “H-Help!” Calling weakly, Howard strained his failing vision to see if the footsteps belonged to someone who would be able to help, or if they merely belonged to an opportunistic bear looking for an easy meal. “Is anyone there?”

The sound of the steps came nearer, crunching on the fallen glass and pine needles and bringing with it the lavender scent, growing stronger. It made his nose itch and he would have sneezed if he knew that it wouldn't make everything hurt even more than it already was.  
Inhaling as much as possible, Howard tried again to gain the attention of whoever, whatever belonged to the lavender.  
“P-please, if someone's there, I need help!” Howard's voice gave out into harsh, wet coughs.

“You're dying, Howard. In about thirty seconds, your broken rib will lose a fragment which will travel along and nick your descending aorta. You will bleed out in a matter of moments. But not until after I leave.”

Howard blinked and tried to clear his vision in order to focus on the woman in front of the cracked window. From what he could see, the woman was pale-skinned and dark haired, but her finer features weren't very defined. Howard figured that his inability to focus on the woman was a function of his injuries. Then what she said suddenly gelled in his mind. After she left.

Before he could express his curiosity, the woman spoke again.

“You don't know me, Howard, but I know you. I know your past and your plans for the future. I know that you've been sitting here for the last few minutes making wild promises to the universe; if only someone will come and help then you'd try to be a better man. It doesn't work that way.”

“Who?” Howard was gasping for air- it was getting harder to breathe.

“Save your energy Howard. There will be time enough for a single question at the end. Just think really loud and I'll be able to hear you.” The woman's voice sounded a little amused.

The woman had to be insane. She could hear him think? Please. The pain was beginning to ebb. He knew enough about field medicine to know that was a bad thing. So she got that part right at least. 

“I'm not insane, Howard. I'm the embodiment of Balance. I maintain the difference between chaos and order, life and death. There are things happening, have been happening for a number of years that have resulted in a near fatal imbalance in the world.  
“We are at a nexus point in time and space, it's like that moment when you have a simmering pot of water on the stove and you know that if you change one small factor, add some salt or bump up the heat just a tiny bit then suddenly you'll have a raging, roiling boil that threatens to spill everywhere or burn your hand.  
“There are things coming that have the potential to change the world and bring it back to alignment, and as much as I know that I sound cold, cruel and callous to your plight, you need to be dead before the rescue team arrives or it will all change. If you survive to be pulled out of the car and convey your message of regrets and pride, it will all go wrong. Every high ideal you once had, your vision to change the world for the better and the innovations you pioneered will be sold off piece-meal to those who would use what you have created to plunge the world into the chaos of fanaticism.”

Howard couldn't believe what he was hearing. This woman, whoever she was, sounded like those doom-and-gloom 'prophets' that he used to walk past on the street corners. If it weren't for how reasonable her tone of voice was, how sincere she sounded, he'd still be trying to scream for help.

“I know that you have your doubts, Howard, but I have a gift for you. Let me show you the futures that could arise should you live, or should you die.”

A cool, smooth hand reached through the shattered window and gently covered his eyes. Suddenly he could breathe easier and it didn't feel like he was drowning. Then the images flashed through his head like a montage in an action movie.  
“Should you live...”

_He could see himself being removed onto a backboard by burly men in flourescent clothing and rushed to an ambulance... Tony coming into the hospital and listening to him for once... Watching as Maria's coffin is lowered into the ground from a wheelchair as Tony stands behind him with tears rolling down his face... Tony forgiving him for his shortfalls and becoming a true partner in the company... Large weapons contracts for the DoD and other agencies bringing in giant profits, stocks climbing to unprecedented heights... Tony marrying a woman that he didn't love, having a family he didn't care about- repeating Howard's mistakes as he was drawn further and further into weapons development... Obadiah hinting and suggesting more weapons designed to subjugate and cause attrition... A civil matter in a remote country that escalates into a continental issue.. Tony falling further into a bottle... War, upon war, upon war until Nations fall into chaos, people unable to feed their families, bodies line the streets while crews try to keep up the demand for graves until it becomes more efficient to just dig a pit and dump them in... A T.V. Broadcast that begins and ends with a familiar tentacled skull on a red field... A bullet's eye view as it breaks a window and finds its home in the skull of his grand son... Tony watching from a tower as the world burns around him, not caring at all... A weird looking human thing- an alien?- sitting on a throne made out of the skulls of the dead..._

Howard gasped out a sob as he was drawn back to his current reality. Hydra? No, it couldn't be them. Steve and the Commandos eliminated them in the war. SHIELD was supposed to be the barrier to stop people like them with messages of hate from ever gaining power. How could they fail so spectacularly? And what was that last thing? 

The hand covered his eyes again as the woman spoke; “Should you die before the rescuers arrive.”

More images flashed through his mind.

_Tony standing stone-faced as he buried his parents, Obadiah standing at his shoulder with a calculating look in his eyes... A front-page newspaper article showing his son passed out on a footpath covered in what looked like whipped cream and clutching a high-heel... Another news article showing Tony standing next to an Air-Force captain declaring an unprecedented partnership between Stark Industries and the DoD in order to develop unmanned surveying drones that would save servicemen and women from frontline ambushes... A tall red-haired woman staring at Tony with bemused exasperation... An ambush in a desert somewhere that left Tony bleeding... A ransom video in a familiar office... Tony with a glowing, miniaturised arc reactor implanted in his chest as plates of metal form up around his body into armour the likes of which Howard had never imagined... Obadiah firing a missile at his son in what looked like a personal tank... A large green man figting an equally large grey man in the middle of Harlem... Tony opening a reimagined Stark Expo... An intimidating looking African-American man with an eyepatch staring up at a giant donut... a silver hammer falling into a desert... The red-haired woman kissing his son on a roof-top and running a hand through Tony's hair tenderly... Steve (Steve?!?) waking up in a hospital room... A flying ship falling out of the sky as a red-gold blur forces a turbine to spin... A portal in the sky above New York that shuts with a bright flash of light... Tony slinking through a mansion dropping Christmas ornaments that explode... The red-haired woman again, this time glowing as though she had liquid fire running through her veins, scooping up a metal glove and firing a beam of light as Tony sat semi-prone behind her... Steve standing on another flying ship reaching out for someone with a metal arm holding a gun- pleading with the man to remember, that he wouldn't fight his friend, that he was with him to the end of the line... Tony, Steve, the red-haired woman, a man with close-cropped salt and pepper hair, a large blonde man, another man that looked as though his nose had been broken a few times and a different red-haired woman all sit together in what looks like a family room as a movie plays in the background; they're all talking and laughing while pieces of pop-corn go flying through the air. Even though they all look as though they've been in at the epicentre of an explosion there's an air of contentment, of peace in the room... The same group of people sitting at a long press-conference table while crowds cheer... Tony and the tall red-haired woman standing in front of a judge, expressions beaming true love for all the world to see, hands clasped together as people smile and throw rice into the air while the normal sounds of New York traffic drift in through the windows..._

Howard came back this time with happy tears stinging the scratches on his face. After some not small measure of heart-ache and pain, Tony would be happy. He would have a woman that he loves in his life, and she would love him in return. There would be a family in Tony's life and he would be able to know the love that Howard had forgotten to give him growing up.  
It was all that Howard ever wanted- Tony to be happy and loved. For the longest time, Howard had thought that leaving a legacy for his son would be enough. Oh, how wrong he was. 

The woman spoke again.

“The ultimate decision is yours, Howard. Being a scientist, I'm sure you're familiar with the notion of fixed events in time and space that will happen regardless of surrounding events. Obadiah's betrayal of your family is one, Hydra's re-emergance is another. Those things can't be changed, but the reaction to them can be. If you decided to let go now, before your rescuers arrive, the first future won't happen because of Tony and his resentment of you. Burying you without a resolution to your differences will be the whip that will drive him to do everything that you didn't. It will be the impetus he needs to stop weapons manufacture and create new things that change the world.  
“Because of Tony's innovations, SHIELD will find your friend in the ice and he will, in turn, expose the strangling parasite of Hydra's machinations and they will wither and die. Tony's lover will be infected with a gene-modifying virus and in the effort to cure her, Tony and his friends will create a treatment that will allow a person's body to regenerate damaged tissue and will cure Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and allow paralised people to walk again.  
“But the choice is yours. I can't make it for you.”

Her hand stroked Howard's face, soothing the sting from his tears. There was no choice. For the short time that there was breath left in his body, Howard would savour the knowledge that his son would carve a path to happiness and contentment, that he would have a family who loved and accepted him.  
If Tony had to hate him, had to resent Howard's actions in order for that to happen, then Howard was willing to be the bad guy. It hurt though. No parent wants to die knowing that their child would become ambivelant to their parents' memory, but Howard was okay with that.  
So long as his son was ultimatly happy.

Taking as deep a breath as the broken ribs would allow, Howard rallied himself to ask the woman a question.

“When the time comes, when it's safe to do so, will you tell Tony that I did and do love him with every part of me, that I couldn't be prouder of the man that he will become and only ever wanted him to be happy. Please?” 

For just a moment, the woman's face came into focus and bright blue eyes seemed to stare into his very soul.

“I will. You have my word, Howard. Sleep now.”

Flashing red and blue lights lit up the broken road above the wrecked car and just as the search and rescue personnel climbed out of the trucks, Howard Stark exhaled a juddering breath and was still. 

When the first responder reached through the remains of the shattered window to feel for a pulse, he noticed that the male victim had tears drying on scratched cheeks and a faint lingering scent of lavender and basil permeated the air.


End file.
